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Academy of Tal R

This autumn, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen’s main exhibition galleries will be filled with the impressive oeuvre of the Danish artist Tal R, recognised as one of the most active and productive artists of our time. His sources of inspiration are divergent. Tal R is also inspired by styles of other artists like Picasso, Dumas and Picabia. The other way around Tal R's work is internationally a point of reference for many comtemporary artists. 'Academy of Tal R' is the first major museum retrospective of this multidisciplinairy artist.

Tal R (Tel Aviv, 1967) has boundless creative energy: he transforms everything in his environment into art. His work looks wild and vital, with a knowingly playful, almost absurdist tone. Tal R freely combines techniques and materials: he paints, draws and makes collages, sculptures and furniture. Tal R is a keen observer, who takes inspiration from reality as well as his imagination. His work fits within the northern European tradition of Edvard Munch, Asger Jorn and Georg Baselitz.

Buy tickets to the museum

Featuring hundreds of works, 'Academy of Tal R' is the artist’s largest exhibition to date. Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen is showing impressive pieces such as 'Deaf Institute', more than forty sculptures and the gigantic 'House of Prince' (2003-05), which comprises around 200 smaller works. Many of the works are in private collections and have rarely been exhibited.

The title 'Academy of Tal R' should be understood as a humorous provocation, since the artist’s work is anything but academic. With a sensory display, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen invites visitors to step into the unique and vivacious world of Tal R.

‘This exhibition shows Tal R’s unbridled energy and productivity, his visual hunger, his inspiration and his versatility. The exhibition is revealing a more subliminal and searching side to his work.’

Sjarel Ex, director of Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen

About Tal R

The exhibition shows that Tal R is a born storyteller with a keen eye for society. Tal R studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts from 1994 to 2000. His artistic ideas are formed by his study of human behaviour and the inspiration he finds in music and literature.

Tal R takes inspiration from high and low culture and borrows from a broad range of figurative and abstract imagery. He describes his method often with the Yiddish word ‘kolbojnik’, which means ‘leftovers’ or ‘waste’. Seen side by side Tal R’s works form an academy of styles and observations that play with the porous membrane between art and life. His more recent paintings show a development in his methodology. He contrasts saturated colours with muted tones: his shimmering, festive scenes are claustrophobic and labyrinthine. His subjects are simple, but their meaning remains mysterious, like in dreams.

Drawing was important to Tal R from an early age: ‘For me, drawing was like dreaming at night: you can’t decide what to dream about; you dream about what you need.’

‘For me, drawing was like dreaming at night: you can’t decide what to dream about; you dream about what you need.’

Tal R

International Top talent

Tal R is well known in Scandinavia and his work is internationally collected. His work was exhibited only once before in the Netherlands and Tal R is largely unknown to the Dutch public. Museum Boijmans van Beuningen keeps its finger on the pulse of the international art world and regularly presents major exhibitions of internationally renowned artists that have been poorly represented in the Netherlands. In recent years, these have included Fischli&Weiss (2003/2004), Urs Fischer (2006), Yayoi Kusama (2008), Pipilotti Rist (2009), Olafur Eliasson (2005, 2010, 2016), Carsten Höller (2010), Paul Noble (2014) and Ugo Rondinone (2016). With this retrospective of the work of Tal R, the museum is adding a new name to this list.

In december a catalogue will be published containing two essays and an image report of the exhibition 'Academy of Tal R' as shown in Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam.

Press quotes

"Judging by his quiet yet joyful energy even at an early hour, the day before the public unveiling of the Academy, Tal R has all the markings of being a morning person. Judging by the sheer amount of work on display, he has all the marking of also being a midday, afternoon, evening and night person. There are paintings, more than 40 sculptures, several weaved pieces, large-format collages and more than 50 —yes, 50— different books on his projects. And then there’s the Deaf Institute, a labyrinthian walkthrough installation made of 99 poster-like pieces." Rab Messina - TLmag

"This is a major exhibition of a major artist, though one with whom you may not yet be familiar. I recommend you get to know Tal R and you will discover an artist whose strength is in his diversity, his fertile imagination and his ability to present his view of the world in a freewheeling, uninhibited way. His work will provide those who are privileged to look at it with a rich seam of art which will prove endlessly stimulating and satisfying." Michael Hasted - ArtsTalk Magazine

Catalogue Academy of Tal R

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art published afull colour cataloque of 225 pages about the work of Tal R and the exhibition shown in their museum in Humlebæk, Denmark. This cataloque is available from 14 oktober in the Museum shop of Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen.

€ 39.95

Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen Catalogue

In Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, curator Sjarel Ex transformed Tal R’s individual works into a site-specific installation that appealed to the visitors’ senses and played with their expectations, while simultaneously adding an extra layer to the artist’s extensive oeuvre. This Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen publication documents this extraordinary installation. Ernst Moritz’s photography and Studio Colorado’s design emphasise the tactility of Tal R’s work. Essays by Sjarel Ex, Roos van der Lint and Esmee Postma provide background information and insights into Tal R’s artistic practice and the genesis of the exhibition. (Dutch / English)